As onion prices squeeze Delhi, deputy CM suspects conspiracy
NEW DELHI: Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Sunday alleged that the central government was “intentionally not supplying” onion to Delhi and that there was a “conspiracy” behind it.
The price of onions in the national capital has increased from ₹40-50 per kg to nearly ₹100 per kg over the last few days. Delhi’s ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) had been blaming each other for the soaring prices of onions in Delhi.
Sisodia said the Centre had stopped providing onions to Delhi government despite repeated requests. He said that when the onion prices started to soar, the central government on September 5, 2019 wrote to the Delhi government saying that they had 56,000 ton stock of onions and would be available for procurement. In reply, the Delhi government stated that it would require 10 trucks of onions, around 250 tons, to distribute on subsidised price in Delhi every day till December 9.
“..After November 24, not a single truckload of onion was given. Irrespective of the written assurance of the onion stock in huge quantity, the union government has not released 10 trucks of onions, but gave maximum five trucks and 3-4 trucks on an average per day that too not full, only 13,000 -14,000 kg (around 13 to 14 tons) of onions altogether,” said the deputy CM.
Delhi’s food and civil supplies minister Imran Hussain said that the Union government suddenly stopped onion supply. “The union government didn’t respond to my letter requesting to release onions supply,” Hussain said, adding that the central government wanted to artificially increase the onion prices in Delhi.
Adil Ahmad Khan, chairman Aazadpur Mandi Committee, said that high onion prices was consistent with trends across the country but that the unavailability of onions from NAFED (National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd.) after November 24 worsened the situation.
Khan said that onions today were coming from Kaithal in Haryana but that was not sufficient. “Crisis is due to high demand, crop loss and shortage of supply. On November 29, we received 1000 ton onion at the Mandi from the farmers. Similarly, a day before the supply was 800 ton only while during the same period in 2018 nearly 1400 ton onion was received per day,” he said.
The BJP had been accusing AAP of playing politics on the issue of onion price rise. Several BJP leaders, including Rajya Sabha MP Vijay Goel and Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari, had protested against the city government on this issue.
Goel denied the AAP government’s allegation that the Centre was blocking supply. He said that when the prices of onion had begun to rise, it was the Union government which requested the AAP dispensation to buy onion at reduced rates from it.
He said that a few days ago, the AAP government had said that the Centre was supplying them onion at a rate of ₹60 per kg, while on the other they say that the onion supply has been stopped by the Union government. “These contradictory statements show that they are telling a lie. They are playing politics over the issue to divert public attention from the failures,” he said.
NEW DELHI: The city’s temperature dipped to a single digit for the first time this season, with the minimum temperature plummeting to 9.4 degree Celsius on Sunday. The dip in temperature as well as the low wind speed contributed to the deterioration of the air quality of the city into the ‘poor’ category.
On Sunday, the maximum temperature was recorded at 22.8 degrees Celsius, three degrees below normal. The minimum temperature reached 9.4 degrees Celsius, which was a notch below the season’s normal. Between 5am and 7am, there was dense fog, which caused visibility at the Palam and Safdarjung observatories to fall to zero metres.
The overall Air Quality Index (AQI) reading of Delhi was also recorded at 250, in the ‘poor’ category, according to the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB). At 8pm on Sunday, the air quality at Dwarka, Nehru Nagar, Jahangirpuri, Rohini, Wazirpur